Matthew Paris's Chronica Majora and Allegations Of
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2018 HAWAII UNIVERSITY INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCES ARTS, HUMANITIES, SOCIAL SCIENCES & EDUCATION JANUARY 3 - 6, 2018 PRINCE WAIKIKI HOTEL, HONOLULU, HAWAII MATTHEW PARIS’S CHRONICA MAJORA AND ALLEGATIONS OF JEWISH RITUAL MURDER MEIER, DAVID DEPARTMENT OF SOCIAL SCIENCES DICKINSON STATE UNIVERSITY DICKINSON, NORTH DAKOTA Dr. David Meier Department of Social Sciences Dickinson State University Dickinson, North Dakota Matthew Paris’s Chronica Majora and Allegations of Jewish Ritual Murder Synopsis: Robert Nisbet recognized Matthew Paris as “admittedly one of the greatest historians, if not the greatest in his day.” Matthew provided “the most detailed record of events unparalleled in English medieval history” from 1236-1259. Within the chronicle, allegations of Jewish ritual murder rested alongside classical sources in various languages, including Greek, Latin, Arabic, and Hebrew. Matthew Paris’s Chronica Majora and Allegations of Jewish Ritual Murder David A. Meier, Dickinson State University Allegations of Jewish ritual murder in medieval European chronicles rested alongside classical sources in various languages, including Greek, Latin, Arabic, and Hebrew. Hartmann Schedel’s Weltchronik 1493 (2001) depicted Simon of Trent’s alleged murder by the local Jewish community in 1475 in a manner that mirrored alleged Jewish ritual murders in England in 1144 and 1255.1 Between 1144 and 1493, allegations of Jewish ritual murder spread and flourished. Matthew Paris’s Chronica Majora emerged at historical crossroads where allegations of Jewish ritual murder spread beyond England and into continental Europe. Before the century finished in 1290, England had expelled its Jewish population inspiring many regions on the continent to follow suit in the coming years.2 In offering a written record, chroniclers bridged narrative history from ancient times (largely Biblical) with contemporary culture, history, society, politics and nascent legal systems, employed, in turn, by both church and state in the High Middle Ages. Interspersed into the chronicles and early law codes, folklore, regional theological disputes, triglossic exchanges, and local history resonate nuanced interests. Given the relative paucity of original documents, chronicles often serve as our only primary sources despite their agendas. Mississippi State University’s Repertorium Chronicarum provides access to many of these online.3 Distressingly mono-causal, Galbert of Bruges (d. 1134) interpreted the political chaos of the twelfth-century century as opening with the pending dynastic crises and the assassination of Charles the Good, Count of Flanders, in 1127.4 However, chronicles rarely addressed causation, motive, or even anything particularly Christian.5 Otto of Freising (1114-1158) as chronicler fits this model perfectly.6 On the other hand, within Toledo, Abraham ibn Daud (1110-1180) defended Rabbinism against Karaism (and indirectly against Islam and Christianity) in his chronicle as anchored in objective historical (Jewish and non-Jewish) sources.7 Centuries later, Hugo Grotius (1583-1645) stepped beyond chronicling into selecting historical examples from Greek and Roman history as evidence of natural law governing war and peace between states.8 Contemporary historians engage the discipline along much the same lines as found in popular histories and historians, including Edward Gibbon’s History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (1776–1789), Peter Massie’s Nicholas and Alexandra (1985), and Barbara Tuchman’s A Distant Mirror (1978), which all display tendencies medieval chroniclers employed with comparable effect.9 Embodying an alternative approach, Carlo Ginzburg and Erich Auerbach probed historical accounts for accuracy in pursuit of the pulse of injustice. Ginzburg and Auerbach isolated authentic historical narratives, avoided formal universal claims extending beyond the event in question, but in a manner not that dissimilar to medieval hagiographies and ritual murder (blood libel) allegations against the Jews.10 Our primary twelfth- century subject, Matthew Paris, according to Robert Nisbet, deserves recognition as “admittedly one of the greatest historians, if not the greatest in his day.”11 As the first step in approaching as allegations of Jewish ritual murder a teaching tool, one should review the blood libel allegations from 1255 preserved in Paris’s Chronica Majora: “In this same year, about the time of the festival of the apostles Peter and Paul [July 27], the Jews of Lincoln stole a boy of eight years of age, whose name was Hugh; and, having shut him up in a room quite out of the way, where they fed him on milk and other childish nourishment, they sent to almost all the cities of England where the Jews lived, and summoned some of their sect from each city to be present at a sacrifice to take place at Lincoln; for they had, as they stated, a boy hidden for the purpose of being crucified. In accordance with the summons, a great many of them came to Lincoln, and on assembling, they at once appointed a Jew of Lincoln as judge, to take the place of Pilate, by whose sentence, and with the concurrence of all, the boy was subjected to divers [sic] tortures. They beat him till blood flowed and he was quite livid, they crowned him with thorns, derided him, and spat upon him. Moreover, he was pierced by each of them with a wood knife, was made to drink gall, was overwhelmed with approaches and blasphemies, and was repeatedly called Jesus the false prophet by his tormentors, who surrounded him, grinding and gnashing their teeth. After tormenting him in divers [sic] ways, they crucified him, and pierced him to the heart with a lance. After the boy had expired, they took his body down from the cross and disembowelled [sic] it; for what reason we do not know, but it was asserted to be for the purpose of practising [sic] magical operations. The boy's mother had been for some days diligently seeking after her absent son, and having been told by the neighbours [sic] that they had last seen him playing with some Jewish boys of his own age, and entering the house of one of that sect, she suddenly made her way into that house, and saw the body of the child in a well, into which it had been thrown. The bailiffs of the city having then been cautiously assembled, the body was found and withdrawn from the well, and then an extraordinary sight was presented to the people, whilst the mother of the child by her cries and lamentations excited the grief and compassion of all the citizens who had flocked together to that place. There was present at this scene one John of Lexington, a man of learning, prudent and discreet, and he thus addressed the people : "We have already learned," said he, " that the Jews have not hesitated to attempt such proceedings as a reproach and taunt to our Lord Jesus Christ, who was crucified;" then addressing a Jew who had been seized upon, and the one whose house the boy had gone into whilst at play, and who was therefore an object of greater suspicion than the others, he said to him: " Wretched man, do you not know that a speedy death awaits you? Not all the gold of England will avail to ransom you, and save you from your fate. However, I will tell you, undeserving as you are, how you may preserve your life and prevent your limbs from being mutilated. Both of these I will guarantee to you, if you will without fear or hesitation disclose to me, without any falsehood, all that has happened on this occasion." The Jew, whose name was Copin, thinking he had found a means of escape, then said, "My lord John, if by your deeds you will repay me for my statements, I will reveal wonderful things to you." Then, being urged on and encouraged by the eloquence of John to do so, he continued: "What the Christians say is true; for almost every year the Jews crucify a boy as an insult to the name of Jesus. But one is not found every year, for they only carry on these proceedings privately, and in out of the way places. This boy Hugh, however, our Jews crucified without mercy, and after he was dead, and when they wished to hide his corpse, considering the body of a child useless to draw an augury from (for which purpose they had disembowelled [sic] it), they could not hide it under the ground as they wished to do ; for in the morning, when they thought it was hidden from sight, the earth vomited it forth, and the corpse appeared unburied above ground; which circumstance struck the Jews with horror. Finally, it was thrown into a well; but even there it could not be kept from sight, for the mother of the child, searching into all these misdeeds, discovered the body of the child and informed the bailiffs." After hearing these disclosures, John detained the Jew in close confinement. When these circumstances came to the knowledge of the canons of the cathedral church of Lincoln, they asked for the body of the child, which was given to them; and after it had been shown as a sight to an immense number of people, it was honourably [sic] buried in the church of Lincoln, as if it had been the corpse of a precious martyr. It should be known that the Jews had kept the boy for ten days, feeding him on milk all that time, so that during life he endured many kinds of torments. When the king, on his return from the north of England, was informed of this occurrence, he reproached John for having promised life and limb to such a wicked being; which he had no right to do; for a blasphemer and murderer like him deserved to die many times over. When the guilty man saw that unavoidable punishment was impending over him, he said, "My death is imminent, nor can John aid, or save me from perishing: now I will tell all bf you the truth.